Firefighters, police search for body in Moncton, N.B., river

Firefighters and police in Moncton, N.B., responded to a call of a body in the Petitcodiac River Sunday morning.

Moncton Fire Department Platoon Chief Keith Guptill said they responded to the call just before 8 a.m.

"There was a report of a body floating in the river coming up with the tide," said Guptill. "Codiac RCMP asked for our assistance in trying to do a recovery."

Guptill said they had their Zodiac boat in the river for about an hour, but did not locate anyone.

The RCMP used a drone in the recovery attempt.

"There was a lot of ice and slush so that might have been holding the body up, but after that cleared and the water was clear it could be that the buoyancy changed and the body may have sunk," said Guptill. "It came into us as a female with a backpack on, so it was pretty specific."

Guptill said the search was conducted behind a restaurant in Dieppe across from the CF Champlain mall.

Recovery operations in the Petitcodiac River are a bit rare, he said.

“Sometimes somebody gets in there with a canoe or something like that, but for recoveries, this is more rare for sure,” he said.

“It’s very difficult this time of year. There was a lot of pack ice that was coming in. Some big chunks and some smaller chunks, a lot of slush that came in with the tide this morning, so we were trying to navigate around that.”

Firefighters from Dieppe and Riverview also participated in the recovery operation.

Guptill said the Codiac Regional RCMP are investigating.

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